Kelly Dwyer of BDL on the 3-point contest: “With that said, I say it’s Durant’s contest to lose. Because of his range and athleticism, he’s the perfect candidate for an exhibition like this. There are other shooters who I’d want spotting up behind the 3-point arc, wide open, with the game on the line, but for a competition where you have to fire off 25 shots in a limited amount of time, from sideline to sideline? My money’s on Durant.”
Henry Abbott of TrueHoop on the contest: “Know who shoots the most 3s in the NBA this year? Jason Richardson, who has made 40 percent of his 305 3-pointers. Somewhere he’s tossing his tear-streaked stat sheet into a mud puddle and screaming “Kevin Durant?” Durant shot far less, and didn’t hit at nearly the same rate. Read more…
I know this just counts as one, but I think we should petition the NBA to give Oklahoma City three losses for this game. Because it was that bad.
Seriously, it was a complete disaster. Turnovers: 24 (a season-high). Missed free throws: eight. Field goal percentage: 41.2 percent. Games in five nights for the Grizzlies: four. Minutes for Memphis’ best player, Rudy Gay: zero. Points for Tony Freaking Allen: 27. Good shots at the buzzer for the Thunder in a tie game: zero.
I feel like I could write this whole things with stats like that.
Early on, it looked like the Thunder was going to take care of business the way they should. They held a pretty good 10-point cushion throughout the first half. But the Grizzlies outscored OKC 30-17 in the third quarter, mainly because they went 13-14 from the free throw line to the Thunder’s 0-0.
The Thunder never executed well in the fourth quarter, but found themselves with the ball and a chance to win with the game tied at 95-95 with 21 seconds left. And I think we all knew what would happen. A bad shot at the buzzer was coming and there was nothing we could do about it. Read more…
UPDATE: Rudy Gay is out for Memphis tonight. And despite being listed as “doubtful” Serge Ibaka is playing through a rib injury.
The Grizzlies are back in town just a couple weeks after coming to Oklahoma City. The season series is tied at 1-1 and no matter what, these two teams always seem to play a pretty good game. Part of it is because Rudy Gay and Kevin Durant are both terrific players and they guard each other. Another is because Memphis has a big edge inside against OKC which makes up for Durant and Russell Westbrook. Read more…
The NBA announced All-Star Weekend’s 3-point contest participants and Oklahoma City’s Kevin Durant is one of them.
Joining Durant will be reigning 3-point champion Paul Pierce of the Celtics and teammate Ray Allen (who will be the all-time 3-point shot maker in history by then). Cleveland guard Daniel Gibson, Miami forward James Jones and Golden State forward Dorell Wright round out the field.
Durant is a career 35.8 percent 3-point shooter but as we know, can cook as well as anyone. He’s had months of 50 percent from deep and after a slow start this year, has his percentage up to 34.7.
Gibson actually has the highest career pecentage of the group at 42.6. Allen has made 39.8 percent of his career 3s, Durant 35.8, Wright 38.3, Jones 40.0 and Pierce 37.0. Allen has hit 2,559 in his career and the only other player in the field with at least a thousand is Pierce, who has hit 1,297. Between Durant, Gibson, Wright and Jones, their total is 1,513.
It’s pretty cool that Durant is participating though. Basically, the Thunder will own All-Star Weekend. Serge Ibaka is in the dunk contest and Rookie/Sophomore game. Durant is in the 3-point contest. Russell Westbrook and KD are in the actual All-Star Game. It’s just going to be an OKC party in L.A.
Chris Sheridan in a chat yesterday when asked if he thinks OKC is making a deal: “I would say they are in the best position of practically any NBA team to make a serious upgrde somewhere, because they have Mo Peterson’s expiring $6.2 million contract plus the rights to a Clippers No. 1 pick to use as trade chips. Plus, they appear to be the quintessenial “one player away” team.”
Daniel Leroux of Real GM trying to get Kevin Love to OKC: “That said, Oklahoma City can make Minnesota an offer they can’t refuse. Part of what differentiates Love and Griffin in terms of trade possibilities is the blossoming of Michael Beasley and the rocky relationship between Love and coach Kurt Rambis. I’m not saying the Wolves are or should be looking to trade Love- the sole issue at point is that they would not hang up the phone immediately if Sam Presti came calling.” It’s fun, but Minnesota’s not trading Love. Read more…
With this season’s edition of the Thunder, we all can’t stop talking about one thing. It’s the one thing that keeps us all from feeling like this team is truly a contender.
Deee-fense. Clap clap.
It’s been mediocre all season and downright awful in stretches. With what the team did last season defensively, watching them give up 60 points in a half, allow 46 percent shooting nightly and nearly 40 percent from 3, it’s easy to be frustrated. Something is missing defensively. Whether it’s Ron Adams or just an overall commitment to that end by the players, there’s been a big step taken backward.
But the same thing keeps getting repeated. Despite that, the team is 33-17. The team is still first in the Northwest and fourth in the West. The team is winning. It’s almost like nobody understands how. Without great defense, how are these guys doing it? IT MAKES NO SENSE.
Offense. Scary excellent offense.
Consider this: Since Dec. 1, the Thunder have the league’s best offense in terms of efficiency. Overall, the Thunder’s scoring 110.8 points per 100 possessions, good for fifth overall in the league. If you want a traditional measure, Oklahoma City is averaging 104.6 points per game, also fifth in the league. Read more…
I think there have been some long shot hopes that Dwight Howard would look at OKC in 2012 when he’s a free agent. And while I have heard he’d love to play with Kevin Durant, it looks like other than re-signing with Orlando, his top three options are the Lakers, Knicks and Nets.
NBA.com power rankings: “The Thunder don’t have to worry about their defense if they keep scoring like they did last week. They shot 54 percent and scored 122.5 points per 100 possessions in wins over the Hornets, Suns and Jazz. Russell Westbrook averaged 20.7 points and 9.7 assists, while shooting 6-for-7 from 3-point rage.” Read more…
The NBA season is over half way done and its time to sit down and assess how things have gone. Joined by “The Godfather” Royce Young of dailythunder.com and CBS Sports, we evaluate each player on the Thunder roster by giving them a grade.
Take a listen and let us know how off we are. The coaching staff is included in the assessment, which should make things a little interesting. Either way, between The Face, The Guy and The Godfather, sit back and enjoy some witty and playful, yet appetisingly articulate banter.
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The first 10 minutes of tonight’s game? Very, very bad. The Jazz started the game 11-11 from the field and OKC was down 13 early on.
The last 38 minutes? Very, very good. The Thunder’s defense never exactly caught up completely, but whoa boy, they shot the ball. Oklahoma City hit a season-high 13 3-pointers on just 21 attempts and overall, hit 56.6 percent from the floor. The Thunder scored 121 points and had 100 with nine minutes to go. Amazing what awesome shooting can do. This is obviously something you can’t expect nightly because I mean, 13-21 from 3 is kind of ridiculous, but for this night, it was what won the game for the Thunder.
While Russell Westbrook led the way with 33 points on 10-15 shooting including 4-4 from 3, the two players of the game were absolutely James Harden and Eric Maynor. The Thunder bench in general was stellar with 33 points total, but late in the first and for a lot of the second quarter, OKC’s bench is completely what brought them back. The starters were totally flat and really, it looked like early on OKC was in danger of getting run out of the building. But Maynor and Harden checked in and slowly, the Thunder worked back in the game.
Harden scored seven quick points, Maynor hit two 3s and just like that, the Jazz lead was down to just one. Maynor had 10 on 4-4 shooting while Harden added 14 on 5-9 plus five assists and six rebounds. Some nights, Harden shows you what he’s totally capable of doing. And this was one of those. He gets you excited with his ability to kind of take over a game both scoring and creating. Games like this one make a good case why he’s solid coming off the bench because he can anchor the second unit and give the Thunder a much needed spark. Read more…
There’s no denying this is an important game for Oklahoma City. With the Utah series tied at 1-1, winning in Salt Lake would be a giant step in possibly winning the Northwest Division. Right now, the Thunder holds a three-game lead over the Jazz so not only is this another game up, it’s a leg up in a possible tie-breaker too. Read more…
(Morning DT. Thank you for your support of Daily Thunder. Thunder up.)
I know this is probably the third or fourth time this video has been posted, but I stumbled across it and couldn’t help but remember how awesome it was. The Broingtons are likely retired forever, but still, what little they gave us was almost enough to last a lifetime.
Apparently the Thunder could only go one game without keeping it close through the final stages, because it took until the last minute of the game Friday to secure a 111-107 victory in Phoenix over the Suns.
Oklahoma City has now had six of its last seven games come down to the final possessions, but has lost only two during that stretch. The latest victory featured a monster effort from Serge Ibaka, including two huge baskets in the final two minutes of the game to reclaim the lead for the Thunder, and another game to give Jeff Green supporters (like me) a reason to smile and ignore his detractors.
Green played a team-high 40 minutes and scored 28 points, the most he’s scored in regulation all season. He went 10-17 from the field, including 3-5 on 3-pointers, and added five boards to pace Oklahoma City on a night when Kevin Durant had “only” 24 points and didn’t make — or take — many crunch-time shots. Green also played effective defense, at least by the Thunder’s standards this year, limiting Phoenix counterpart Channing Frye to 13 points on 17 shots. Read more…
The Suns gave the Thunder one of their worst losses of the season in December after Phoenix had just made the trade for Marcin Gortat, Vince Carter and Mickael Pietrus. The Suns only had seven active players and were playing without much firepower at all. Except OKC came out flat and dropped a bad one. Read more…
Should the Thunder make a deal? Berry Tramel: “I say no. Unless some fools like the T-Wolves or Clippers want to give you something for nothing. But otherwise, any trade the Thunder could make would be acquiring short-term gain at long-term expense. Why would you do that? The NBA has very few Rocky Colavito-for-Harvey Kuenn trades. Very few deals in which both teams get equal talent. They’re mostly finances-based. No reason for the Thunder to shoot the moon this season; they’re not winning the NBA championship no matter who they get.”
Russell Westbrook will join Kevin Durant in Los Angeles as part of the Western Conference All-Star team, the NBA announced Thursday.
Westbrook, a native of Los Angeles and an alum of UCLA, surely will relish the fact that his first All-Star Game is in L.A.
The selection is well-deserved for Westbrook who has had a fantastic season. He’s the only player in the league averaging at least 22 points, eight assists and five rebounds a game. It’s kind of becoming the “Westbrook Line” as he was the only point guard with those type of numbers last year too.
There’s no doubt Westbrook should be there. As a third year player, he’s had 23 double-doubles and three triple-doubles, typing LeBron for tops in the league.
Joining Westbrook on the Western reserve squad is Deron Williams, Blake Griffin, Dirk Nowitzki, Tim Duncan, Pau Gasol and Manu Ginobili. Kevin Love and LaMarcus Aldridge are the big snubs in the West. Luckily, Westbrook isn’t joining them on that list.
Kelly Dwyer of BDL on the 3-point contest: “With that said, I say it’s Durant’s contest to lose. Because of his range and athleticism, he’s the perfect candidate for an exhibition like this. There are other shooters who I’d want spotting up behind the 3-point arc, wide open, with the game on the line, but for a competition where you have to fire off 25 shots in a limited amount of time, from sideline to sideline? My money’s on Durant.”
